


Quoth the Raven

by Wind_Ryder



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Addiction, Astronaut, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pain, Rehab, Suffering, Tragedy, space, void
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-21
Updated: 2014-10-21
Packaged: 2018-02-22 00:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2487785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wind_Ryder/pseuds/Wind_Ryder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All Victor Trevor wanted to be was an astronaut. All Sherlock wanted to do was be high. It doesn't work out well for either of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quoth the Raven

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ImpishTubist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImpishTubist/gifts), [TheTalentedMrHolmes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheTalentedMrHolmes/gifts).



> Based on a tumblr prompt conversation by booholmvs, archea2, and impishtubist.

They had it planned since they were kids in University. Sherlock had secured the booze and Victor had secured the dream. They had to journey out of the city. Light pollution made it nearly impossible to see everything. Victor brought his telescope and set it up out on a hill. They lay out on their backs, looking up to the heavens, and Victor would quote poetry as he found Sherlock a star. _Once upon a midnight dreary…_ he always began. Sherlock drank his way into oblivion, rolling his eyes at all the lines of Poe that Victor could muster.

 

“I’m going to go up there one day,” Victor told him proudly whenever he finished. He was only a semester away from graduation, and his eyes were wide with hope.

 

“It’s boring,” Sherlock told him. He liked these trips only because it was an excuse to get drunk and get laid. He put up with Victor, ignoring almost everything he had to say about the stars and the universe, because frankly it wasn’t very interesting at all. Who cared what happened out there? It didn’t affect what was going on down here.

 

Victor had finished calibrating his telescope and had it focused directly on a mars. “Come, come see,” he beckoned. Sherlock sighed and pushed himself upright. He closed one eye and squinted. “It’s beautiful isn’t it?”

 

“It’s red, and very far away.”

 

“We’re going to go to Mars one day. I can feel it.”

 

“We haven’t even landed on the moon, and you want to go to Mars.” Victor rolled his eyes. They’d argued about it for hours until he finally conceded that he’d never convince Sherlock the moon landing was real. Sherlock was a natural skeptic. He only believed what he held in his hands, and Victor promised him he would give him a moon rock one day. Then he’ll believe.

 

“Think about it, another planet,” he continued, undeterred.

 

“I’m thinking about this planet. I’m bored,” Sherlock turned and let his fingers trail down Victor’s body. He was nudged out of the way so Victor could keep looking through the telescope.

 

“We’re going to do it. We will.”

 

“Now?” Sherlock asked, purposefully obtuse as he leaned into Victor’s legs.

 

“What? No not now, we don’t have the technology, but someday-” Victor squeaked as Sherlock pressed a hand up between his legs.

 

“Now?” Sherlock repeated with a grin.

 

“You’re insatiable.”

 

“And you’re insane, we can’t all get what we want.”

 

“But you can, right?” Victor asked with a grin. He ran his fingers through Sherlock’s curls, and rocked against his touch.

 

“Right.”

 

They went out to the hill at least four times a week. Victor dreamed about the stars and Sherlock got laid, and they both returned to London slightly tipsy and very happy. It was a dream, and nothing more, until they graduated and Victor immediately was scooped up by the UK Space Agency.

 

“Will – I did it, I did it – I got _in!_ ” Victor was practically trembling with excitement. He was babbling about practices and policies and interviews, and Sherlock was far more interested in pushing him back on his sofa and having his way with him. “I’m going to space!”

 

“You’re going to the Space Programme, very good job, that. Congratulations. A desk job. Wonderful. Clothes off.” Sherlock nosed at Victor’s neck as he fumbled with his buttons.

 

“But I’ll be training, and I’ll be accepted into astronaut school, and then-”

 

“And then you’ll be too old, or too sick, or too something, and none of it will _matter_. It’s years from now and you’re not going to space. We don’t do that. Ever. It’s so terribly out of date. Now please, clothes off!” Victor scowled and caught Sherlock by the arms.

 

“Tell me you’re proud of me,” he demanded.

 

“I’m proud of you,” Sherlock told him sincerely. “But you know the likelihood of you becoming an astronaut is very small. Why get your hopes up for an even greater disappointment?”

 

“Because I’ve never proved you wrong before, and by God am I going to do that now. I’m going to go out to space and get you a moon rock and then you’re going to believe – we really landed on the moon.” Victor caught Sherlock’s body and twisted so he was lying above him. “I’m going to best you, William,” he kissed his neck, “Sherlock,” his cheek, “Scott,” his brow, “Holmes,” he lips. Sherlock sagged against him and wrapped his arms tight around his body.

 

“No you won’t,” he decreed easily. Somewhere, someplace, the phone was ringing. Someone was calling, and neither answered because neither cared. They were happy and were with each other, and nothing could pull them down. Victor was in the Space Programme, and Sherlock was getting laid. He wasn’t even intoxicated. It was a good day.

 

Whoever it was could wait. They had the rest of their lives to deal with tomorrow, and today was too perfect to let go. That night, Victor and Sherlock went out to their hill. They sat beneath the stars, and Victor read him poetry. _Only this and nothing more…_

 

Sherlock went to rehab.

 

Sherlock got out of rehab.

 

Sherlock relapsed.

 

Sherlock went back to rehab.

 

Victor became an astronaut.

 

Sherlock overdosed.

 

“I’m going to space,” he told Sherlock wearily, sitting at his bedside as they looked out the window together. The hospital hated Sherlock, and Sherlock hated the hospital. His curls had been cut short, his body turned weak and debilitated. He was exhausted all the time, and he hadn’t even mustered the energy to make a sexual pass at his age-old partner and friend. They sat together more often than not, Victor clutching to his poems and dreams, reaching for the stars as Sherlock floundered for his place on the earth.

 

“No one ever goes to space,” Sherlock told him quietly.

 

“I am. I’m going to space. I’m going to the International Space Station.” Victor nudged Sherlock’s scarred arm. There was a faint outline of the moon in the bright blue sky. “Look, someone left the moon switch on.”

 

“It’s a reflection off the-”

 

“I know, Will.” Victor sighed heavily and wrapped his arms around Sherlock’s shoulders. “I’m going to space, what are you going to do while I’m gone?”

 

“Maybe I’ll die.” Victor froze around him, and then let lout a slow breath of air.

 

“Don’t say that.” He was angry, and Sherlock knew he shouldn’t have gone that far, but really everything was getting so drab and grey these days he couldn’t be bothered for pleasantries. He settled back against Victor’s chest.

 

“Maybe I’ll live,” he added, and he felt Victor loosen his grip just a touch more.

 

“You’ve got to live long enough for me to get you a moon rock,” he bargained. Sherlock laughed, low and quiet.

 

“All right. Until you get me a moon rock.”

 

“Promise me.”

 

“I promise. I won’t die until you get me a moon rock.”

 

“And the drugs?” Sherlock hesitated.

 

“When do you come back?”

 

“Forty-eight days.”

 

“I…I can hold out forty-eight days.” It was a start. A small start, but a start nonetheless. They watched the moon’s reflection as it shifted about the sky, and they watched until the sun went down and the stars came out. Victor pointed out to a blinking light far off in the distance.

 

“I’m going there,” he breathed out softly. “I’m going to space.”

 

_Nameless here for evermore._

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

 

Victor was in outer space, and it was everything he wanted it to be and more. He took photo after photo, he wrote down all the data he could, he pocketed a vial of moon dust, and he even made off with a stone. He was an astronaut, but he was also a romantic, and he made a promise.

 

He ran experiments and video recorded messages to Sherlock. “Will…I wish you were out here. You have to _feel_ this. It’s like…it’s like…it’s like being alive for the first moment of your life, and everything is new. God you’d love it here.”

 

He went out on the line and he floated in space, he worked on the exterior of the space station and he stood watching the earth from the outside. He took a picture of the UK and knew when he got home he’d show it to Sherlock and tell him that he saw him, from all the way up here. He imagined Sherlock looking up at the stars, finding the space station, and making a crude gesture. He hoped he did. It sounded like a good thing for Sherlock to do.

 

He boarded his shuttle when he was time to leave, and he grinned as he thought of the moon rock in his pocket and the look on Sherlock’s face when he saw it. He was going home, and he couldn’t wait to see his best friend, his partner, his _Will._

 

The explosion tore through the shuttle, and later the papers would say there had been a mechanical short that sparked in the fuselage. Everything had gone wrong from there. The shuttle was torn apart, and there was nothing they could do to protect the equipment or the crew.

 

Down below, the explosion couldn’t even been seen. It was daytime on Earth, and no one save the space stations were even aware there was a problem. No one knew what to say.

 

_Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”_

 

To his credit, Sherlock lasted all forty-eight days. On the forty-ninth, he paced the halls of his flat ninety-nine times and waited for something to change. Victor’s books lined the walls and his pictures coated the table. Their home was a shine to Victor’s presence, and Sherlock felt it itching under his skin as he looked at it all.

 

By nightfall, he called his brother and quietly asked what the status of Victor’s mission was. Mycroft arrived less than an hour later. It was snowing, like ash after a fire kicked up by the wind. “Where is he?” Sherlock asked quietly.

 

“There’s been…an accident.”

 

“What kind of accident?” Sherlock asked slowly, wondering faintly if his brother was having him on. It’d been some time since Mycroft had tried, but he wouldn’t put it passed him.

 

“Sherlock…Victor’s shuttle had malfunction. It was destroyed.” Sherlock blinked rapidly, mind whirling about as he tried to process that bit of information.

 

“So…he’s still on the station?” Mycroft looked a bit sick as he shook his head. His lips were pinched and his skin was an ugly green. He smoothed one hand over his tie and adjusted his knot.

 

“No, he was on the shuttle when it…became inert.”

 

“He was picked up, then? By someone, there’s protocols or something?” Sherlock didn’t understand why his legs gave out from under him, but suddenly he was on the ground. He was on the ground, staring at his brother’s shoes, and that didn’t make any sense whatsoever. Mycroft couched before him, knee going into something that looked suspiciously like mud tracked in from lazy shoes.

 

“Sherlock, he’s lost-”

 

“So find him.”

 

“Sherlock-”

 

“How hard could it be to find someone, there’s not exactly anywhere for him to _hide_.”

 

“Sherlock-”

 

“I mean, he’s all in white too-”

 

“ _William._ ” Sherlock’s mouth snapped closed. He stared at his brother, blinking rapidly as he shook his head.

 

“What are you telling me?” he asked.

 

“I’m sorry. Victor’s dead.” Outside the snow was falling like ash, and Sherlock felt like he was falling with it, sinking into the earth and melting into oblivion.

 

_Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”_

Mycroft refused to leave Sherlock alone. He sat with him, almost sat _on_ him, and kept him from doing anything drastic. It wouldn’t have mattered. Sherlock didn’t do anything. He sat on the floor of the flat, mind whirling and whirling, and eyes blinking rapidly to no end. He couldn’t process a thing.

 

Mycroft quietly tried to ply him with food and water, but he made no move to even register his brother’s presence. He sat where he’d fallen, and he tried to understand what had happened. His brother had given him more details in a foolish attempt to try to help him move on. It only served to make his mind see it all the clearer. He could see Victor sitting at a series of panels. He could see Victor tapping away at buttons. He could see Victor burning.

 

He retched badly, and didn’t even bother trying to move to the kitchen or bathroom. Instead, he coughed to the side, and knelt above it, staring at the sick and wondering what on earth he was meant to do now. He had no idea, none at all. He was tired, and he was empty, and there were dreams to be had, and dreams to be broken.

 

They had sat out on the hill all those nights, and Victor had his dreams and the only thing he had was his inebriation. He’d never brought anything to the table, and now Victor’s dreams were gone and he was alone in a state of forced sobriety. The world was empty at his feet, and Sherlock felt himself drifting.

 

He cried, he cried for hours and his brother, never one to offer comfort, sat with him and let him stain his suit with snot and tears. His brother knelt in the mud, inches from a pile of sick, and held him as his mind and soul shattered and his body decided it wasn’t worth holding on.

 

Days passed.

 

Mycroft had to drag Sherlock to the bathroom in order for him to void. He had to physically hold him upright in the shower in order for him to bathe. Sherlock didn’t speak, didn’t question it, didn’t bother. Depression hit hard and fast. Sherlock didn’t sleep, and refused to enter his bedroom.

 

Mycroft did, only to try to find clothes and another blanket to wrap around Sherlock’s body. There were stick on stars on the ceiling, building out constellations and accented by tiny satellites. One or two had fallen off onto the floor. Mycroft had them replaced before Sherlock noticed. He didn’t need to see falling stars anytime soon.  

 

When the phone rang, they almost didn’t answer it. They almost didn’t care. But Mycroft was better than Sherlock was, and he was more used to handling crisis’s. He answered his phone, and he listened as hope was returned.

 

“A rescue effort was sent out from the Space Station,” Mycroft murmured. “They found Victor. He was adrift. He’s alive. They’ve returned to Earth-”

 

“I don’t understand.” They were the first words Sherlock managed, and they were physically painful to speak. They actually made Sherlock’s chest sear as though it had received a physical blow. His head was numb, his eyes burned, his fingers shook.  “You said he was dead. You said. You said. He’s not here. I don’t understand.” Mycroft tried to explain, slowly and with great patience, but Sherlock only repeated one phrase. “I don’t understand. I don’t understand.”

 

_Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”_

Victor returned to the flat nearly one month later. He was shaky on his feet, quiet and withdrawn. He walked in the door, found Sherlock trembling in the sitting room, and collapsed at his side. Sherlock clung to him, and he clung to Sherlock, and neither spoke of dreams or happiness. Neither spoke of the world beyond their four walls. Neither spoke of anything at all. They held onto each other, and they panicked at the thought of abandonment, and this was their curse for playing God.

 

Victor was afraid to be alone. Sherlock was afraid he’d wake up to find that a fever dream had possessed him again. He was afraid that it would all be fake, that this was a delusion brought on by an overdose he’d gladly taken in hopes of being reunited with the only person he’d ever cared for. He told this to Victor once, who in return held him tight and buried his nose into Sherlock’s spine. He didn’t say a word. He didn’t complain. He didn’t argue. He just held him close, and didn’t let him go.

 

They didn’t go to sleep in their bedroom. They pulled the mattress onto the floor of the sitting room and refused to enter that room with its stars and its moon. Victor didn’t talk about space. He didn’t talk about his dreams. He didn’t talk at all. He just sat with Sherlock, trembling endlessly in the dark. He was cold all the time, and he always held a hand to his mouth as though testing that he was still breathing.

 

“He’s traumatized, Sherlock,” Mycroft told him when Sherlock dared to text out a question regarding Victor’s behavior. “Aren’t you?” Sherlock didn’t respond. Instead, he threw his phone to the side and he burrowed closer to Victor. Victor, who never once looked up at the night sky, and who tore down every picture of space that existed within their home, held him closer.

 

They were terrified.

 

They were broken.

 

At least they had each other.

 

When Victor finally started to speak, he couldn’t stop. He gasped around the words, trembling and terrified, clinging to Sherlock like he would disappear. “It was a void. It was a void…floating with no way out – pushed further and further and not being able to do _anything_. And all around was black and stars and the earth and the moon, and the sun – burning into my eyes and it was too much and I-I couldn’t hear anything. It was quiet, and too bright, and too cold, and too empty, and I watched the earth spin, and I was going to die, and the air was running out, and no one was coming, and you were there, and I wanted to see you one last time and I wouldn’t, and I dreamed you were, and I-” he fell apart. He was wracked with sobs and Sherlock let him fall into his arms. “Am I here? Are we together?”

 

“We’re here. We’re together,” Sherlock whispered. Victor held him even tighter, and Sherlock wished he knew what he was supposed to do now. He could barely find his own footing, he didn’t know how he was supposed to help Victor find his. But listening to Victor’s story, he thought of only one line from Victor’s favorite poem.

 

 _Darkness there and nothing more._  

 

_~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*_

There are things they learned.

 

Victor could no longer swim. The sensation of floating was too much, too real. He screamed in a void, trapped in his head, and Sherlock pulled him out of it. He pulled him from the pool and he pulled him from view. He spoke to him until the panic stopped and reality subsided. Victor fell to his knees and clung to the earth, breathing in huge gulping gasps even as his face went pale and waxy.

 

Sometimes, when Victor thought Sherlock wasn’t paying attention, Sherlock would watch him ration his breaths. He allowed himself a set number of breaths per minute, and if he ever breathed in too much, he would panic and shake. He mumbled about carbon dioxide sometimes, and Sherlock set about making air filtration systems that ran through their flat because Victor was insistent, sometimes, that they didn’t have enough oxygen to last.

 

Victor couldn’t handle the silence. There always needed to be something. They left the radio on, the TV, the window open. They let sounds of life filter through their world and Sherlock played endless medleys on his violin. The moment the silence became too much, Victor made his own. He talked to himself, he shivered violently, and he counted his breaths with far too much focus.

 

He was cold all the time. Their flat was kept at a balmy 33 degrees that had their bills skyrocket and their guests’ shift uncomfortably. Sherlock took to walking about in nothing but a shirt and shorts, but Victor still bundled up in layers upon layers of clothes. He shivered unconsciously no matter where or what he was doing. He drank cup after cut of hot tea.

 

There are things they learned.

 

They were both desperate for each other, and perhaps that was a little unhealthy, but they were broken and jaded and lost. Sherlock no longer used drugs and liquor to survive. Victor no longer dreamed. They lost their passions, they found new ones, and they leaned heavily against each other as they did so.

 

They had new dreams, and new desires, and they approached them together and not apart. They tore the stars from their ceiling and painted over blemishes with the pale blue of morning. They directed their gaze downwards and they cherished what they had already.

 

“Do you love me, Will?” Victor asked him quietly.

 

“More than anything,” Sherlock replied. And Victor, who knew Sherlock lied and exaggerated about almost everything in his life, didn’t doubt him this time. In all the months and years they’d taken to move on from that horrible memory, Sherlock hadn’t returned to drugs. He hadn’t mentioned them. He hadn’t tried.

 

“There’s something I brought back with me,” Victor told him quietly. “Beside all this…” he motioned to his body and his obvious difficulties. There was a ring in his pocket and he pulled it out. The stone was ugly and grey and porous. It was misshapen and deformed, much like their minds and their souls.  When he asked Sherlock to marry him, to share their equally uncomfortable lives at each other’s side, dependent and healing and understanding all in one, he did so with five words. Sherlock said he wouldn't die, repeated the same five words, and he took the ring and all its significance with him.

 

He carried the reminder that Victor could very well have been lost forever, and that the trauma would always be there. He accepted that. Just as Victor accepted that his addiction would always be there, and his pain would never truly fade. Ugly for ugly. Tragedy for tragedy.

 

“Merely this and nothing more.”

**Author's Note:**

> Like what you see? Want to say hi? Have a prompt? 
> 
> Find me on tumblr! falcon-fox-and-coyote.tumblr.com


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